ECHR

So here we are again: the usual suspects frothing about leaving the European Court of Human Rights, as if it’s the last villain in some feverish Brexit sequel no one asked for. Apparently, it's all the ECHR’s fault that the government can’t run a functioning asylum system, police force, or even post office. If only we could cut ties with Strasbourg, everything would be fine. Spoiler: it wouldn’t.

Let’s inject some actual facts. Since 1975, the ECHR has ruled on 571 UK cases. Out of those, immigration-related rulings are vanishingly rare - fewer than a dozen have ever seriously interfered in removals or asylum. The Court isn’t stopping Britain from enforcing immigration rules. It’s stopping Britain from becoming the sort of country where the government can do whatever it likes to whoever it likes, without consequence.

And that’s the bit Reform voters never seem to get. The ECHR doesn’t just protect migrants. It protects you. Yes, you - the ordinary British citizen who doesn’t have the cash for fancy lawyers or the clout to fight the state on your own.

Remember Gillan & Quinton? Two Brits stopped and searched by police under “terror” laws for the crime of walking near an arms fair with a camera. The ECHR ruled the law was so vague it violated their privacy rights.

Or Big Brother Watch v UK, where British journalists found out the state was hoovering up everyone's emails and phone data like a digital vacuum on crack. The ECHR said no - your privacy matters.

Or Keenan v UK, where a 28-year-old British man died in prison after being denied mental health care. The ECHR ruled his treatment was inhuman. Without that ruling, his death would’ve been just another footnote in Whitehall’s bin.

Even prisoners - yes, even them - had rights upheld in Hirst v UK, where the blanket ban on voting was ruled unlawful. Not because murderers need ballots, but because if you let the state strip away rights wholesale, it’s only a matter of time before it’s your rights next.

So let’s be blunt. Leaving the ECHR doesn’t hit “illegals.” It hits everyone without money or power. It removes the last line of defence when your government locks you up without charge, spies on you without warrant, or leaves your loved one to rot in a cell. And it puts us in the same league as Russia and Belarus — the only countries to walk away from the Court.

Reform UK and their pub-patriot fanbase bang on about freedom. But the minute you ask them which freedoms they're actually defending, they go quiet - or start shouting about dinghies. Because truthfully, they don't want freedom. They want vengeance dressed up as policy. And they’re willing to torch your civil liberties to get it.

So next time someone sneers about "foreign judges" or calls for the ECHR to be binned, ask them a simple question: when it’s your rights on the line - who’s going to stop the state for you?

Because without the ECHR, the answer is: no one.